Tag: Beyond Primary Care

Anxiety (in part) Explained

admin

22 February 2019

One of the most common medical conditions I treat as a family medicine doctor is anxiety. You most likely know what anxiety is, or personally know someone who suffers from anxiety. At my family medicine clinic, Beyond Primary Care, located in Ann Arbor Michigan, all appointments are a minimum 30 minutes, with opportunities to increase the appointment time. This length of time is an important for the treatment of any mental health concern.

What Is Anxiety?

Anxiety has many faces. Among others, it is that feeling of stress, apprehension, relentless worrying, tightness in your stomach or chest, racing thoughts, restlessness, rapid breathing, diarrhea, lack of concentration, and insomnia.

Does a person have to experience all those symptoms to have anxiety?

Absolutely not.

Does having even just one symptom mean you need medical treatment?

The best answer is that it depends on you and the severity is.

Anxiety is a NORMAL Human Emotion

Dr. Jeff O’Boyle (who is writing this posts) experiences anxiety, you (who is reading this post) have experienced anxiety. Everyone has experienced anxiety. I feel a bit like Oprah when I just wrote that. Regardless, the truth is we all experience anxiety from the moment we are born.

Think about your own children, or other children you knew as newborns. The frequent cycles of crying and calmness. The newborn doesn’t know why they are wet, why they are hungry, why they feel cold, why they can’t sleep. So they cry. This is in part- anxiety. Eventually, after a few weeks (or months for some parents), the newborn stops crying. Overtime when there is a dirty diaper, or it learns that it will be feed every 3 hours, or the baby starts connecting it’s sleep cycles and starts doing it’s nights- much to the relief of the parents- the crying and fits decrease. The point is, we all have anxiety as newborns. We develop coping mechanisms though, inherent within our own emotional control centers to deal with this anxiety.

Treatment of Anxiety

Just as no two people are affected the exact same way by anxiety, there is no “one size fits all” treatment that cures this condition. What works for one person might not work for another. The best way to treat yourself is to become as informed as possible about the treatment options, and then tailor them to meet your needs.

In my professional opinion, becoming informed about anxiety does mean you have to be honest to yourself with how you feel. Extending that honesty to your family and friends you trust, and honest to your healthcare provider is crucial is knowing that your mental health is not something to deal with alone.

Patience with Treatment

It also takes time to find the right treatment. It might take some trial and error to find the treatment and support that works best for you. Understand how these treatments work and that they don’t work immediately. Anxiety cannot be treated like a case of bronchitis, where you get a course of antibiotics and poof- you are better in 10 days. In today’s society, I feel we are so focused on instant gratification and grossly appreciable results that we lose focus on the long-term control and relief.

Your emotional system only knows where it is at right now based upon where it just was. This is why in this work we are constantly reassessing our intervention afterwards. Where are you now? Now we do something. Where are you now? So we know if we are being effective or not. Do you want to waste your time doing stuff if you don’t know it’s working? I don’t. I want to do more of the stuff that is working and less of it that isn’t. As a doctor I’m constantly measuring.

But measuring anxiety, or any other component of mental health is not done over minutes to days, but weeks to months. Again, patience is key to treatment.

BPC Good Eats: Brussels Sprout and Apple Pizza

admin

19 February 2019

Hello and thank you reading my blog at Beyond Primary Care and trying the BPC Good Eats recipes. This featured recipe is a Brussels Sprout and Apple Pizza. These recipes are my attempt, in a way, to bridge that Doctor’s adage of “Eat Better & Exercise More.” In this post, I will showcase a healthy meal made on a budget, my pictures are pretty decent, and that is how I got into this food endeavor.

Instructions1) Preheat oven to 425F2) Place walnuts, parmesan cheese, and 1 tablespoon olive oil in a food processor and process until crumbly. Season with salt and pepper.3) In a large skillet over medium-high heat, add 1 tablespoon oil. Once heated, add the brussels sprouts and apple splices; cooking about 10 minutes- until apples and sprouts being to brown.4) Add the honey and thyme to the skillet and stir until mixed, then remove the skillet from the heat.5) Top prepared pizza crust with walnut mixture, then the sauteed Brussels sprouts and apples. Top with shredded fontina cheese.6) Bake for 10-15 minutes.

BPC Good Eats: Spinach and Cheese Ravioli with Meatballs

admin

8 February 2019

Hello and thank you reading my blog at Beyond Primary Care and trying the BPC Good Eats recipes. This featured recipe is a Spinach and Cheese Ravioli with Meatballs. These recipes are my attempt, in a way, to bridge that Doctor’s adage of “Eat Better & Exercise More.” In this post, I will showcase a healthy meal made on a budget, my pictures are pretty decent, and that is how I got into this food endeavor.

Instructions1) Bring a medium pot of water to a boil.Cook the ravioli according to package directions until al dente. Drain water ravioli, place ravioli in a bowl and set aside.2) Place a saute pan over medium-high heat, cook the meatballs until tender.3) While the pasta and meatballs cooks, heat the oil in a large stainless pan/skillet over medium-high heat. Add the onion and cook until tender and translucent, approx. 5 minutes. Add garlic for 2 minutes.4) Add butter and garlic to the pan. Once butter has melted, add flour and whisk constantly with a metal whisk until the butter and flour are well combined and the mixture darkens in color a bit.5) Pour in milk and whisk vigorously to combine. Whisk often until mixture thickens. Add parmesan, pesto salt, and pepper.6) Once your sauce has reached desired thickness, fold in your chopped spinach and cooked ravioli and meatballs.7) Thin sauce if desired with additional milk and adjust salt and pepper to taste. Remove from heat, top with grated mozzarella and cover with the pot’s lid to melt the cheese.

Direct Primary Care Works With Your Insurance

admin

5 February 2019

Hi, thank you for reading! My name is Dr. Jeff O’Boyle. I am a board certified family medicine physician. My clinic, Beyond Primary Care is located in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In this post I am answering a common question that I receive, and that is does Direct Primary Care (DPC) work with your insurance? The answer for a vast majority of DPC clinics is yes, DPC works with your insurance, but not for your insurance. This is an important distinction.

DPC does not work FOR your insurance

This is the essence of DPC, that it works directly for you- the patient! We forgo insurance payments in order to save our patients from the arbitrary, intrusive decisions that inevitably follow with third-party payers (health insurance). Furthermore, since DPC practices are independent, we are free from hospital contractual agreements and can offer reduced prices on laboratory tests, imaging, and medications. As noted by this Wall Street Journal article, hospital systems are ignorant of their actual costs. Instead, they often increase prices to meet profit margins.

DPC works WITH your insurance

While DPC’s goal is to cover the vast majority of healthcare needed for all individuals, there are many instances in which a patient may need to utilize their insurance to see providers or utilize services outside the membership.

Specialist Referrals

This would be when a member needs to see a specialist for a condition that requires care past what could be offered in a family medicine clinic. Examples include physician specialist, psychiatrists, counselors, and physical therapists.

Say a member needs a referral to an oncologist- which is a doctor that specializes in the diagnosis and treatment of cancers. No one ever anticipates needing a such a doctor. But when called upon, a DPC doctor will work to find a doctor that accepts your insurance, help coordinate your care, while minimizing your financial impact. How do we minimize your financial impact? If that specialist requires imaging, medications, or blood work, DPC practices will work with you to find the lowest costs– often through our DPC clinics- that meet the needs of the health provider.

Hospitalization Coordination

From time to time, accidents or serious medical conditions do occur and an elevated level of care is required where a member needs to be monitored 24/7 by a team of doctors and providers.

An example could be a member suffers a broken arm from falling and needs to be hospitalized for a major surgery. DPC will help communicate with your inpatient hospital team of providers making sure they know your current health status and working towards understanding your options for care upon discharge. While we may not be able to care for you in the hospital, we can certainly use virtual medicine (also known as telemedicine) to discuss your needs and questions. We can also give you helpful advice to make sure you won’t receive any unexpected bills from the hospital upon your discharge.

The following picture is a hospital bill from a patient who posted her hospital bill online. The patient was contemplating hurting themselves and walked into an Emergency Room seeking help. The patient states the “physician charges” are NOT shown that bring the grand total to over $18,000!

Here is some FREE Doctor Advice from Beyond Primary Care: In the hospital, ask to know the identity of every unfamiliar person who appears at your bedside. If you’re too ill, ask a companion to serve as gatekeeper. Write it down. What seems like a pleasantry may constitute a $700 consultation

Special Medications

One of the coolest features about DPC is many practices offer in-clinic dispensing of hundreds of generic medications, often at substantial price differences compared to retail pharmacies. Still, there are times a member needs or would benefit from a certain medication that is brand name only (very expensive) and would be best obtained through insurance that requires a prior-authorization from the insurance company.

In this scenario, we will work to fill out the necessary paperwork to get your needed medications at reduced costs or even reach out to the pharmaceutical companies seeking a reimbursement or free supplies on your behalf. A great example is we got one of our members Vivitrol, a vital medication for Medication Assisted Therapy in Addiction Medicine. This medication costs over $1,000 on the market, but we worked to get our member the medication FREE of charge with their insurance. Did I mention the office visit and the injection itself were included with the membership? So the patient literally paid $0. Saving money for our patients gets me so excited!

BPC Good Eats: Stuffed Cabbage Klumpke

admin

28 January 2019

Hello and thank you reading my blog at Beyond Primary Care and trying the BPC Good Eats recipes. This featured recipe is a Stuffed Cabbage Klumpke. These recipes are my attempt, in a way, to bridge that Doctor’s adage of “Eat Better & Exercise More.” In this post, I will showcase a healthy meal made on a budget, my pictures are pretty decent, and that is how I got into this food endeavor.

Instructions1) Bring large stock pot of water (½ filled) to boil.2) Peel off any bad exterior cabbage leaves. Place whole cabbage in pot for 5 minutes.3) Remove cabbage from pot. Carefully peel off cabbage leaves (try not to split them), until you reach leaves that are not cooked or do not peel easily off. Return the remaining cabbage ball to the pot and cook for 4-5 minutes.4) Remove cabbage from pot. Reserve 2 cups of the cooking liquid. Peel additional leaves until you have approximately 12-15. With each large leaf take a knife flat against the leaf and trim off excess vein (the part that connects the leaf to the root). The goal is to have a flat, pliable leaf to work with.5) Quarter the remaining heart of the cabbage, set aside. Mix together all of the filling ingredients in a medium bowl.6) Lay out a large cabbage leaf. In the middle place about ¼ cup of filling. Starting with the vein side, fold the cabbage leaf over the filling. Then fold in the sides and roll until a small pouch is made. Secure the roll with a toothpick. Repeat with all remaining large leaves.7) Heat a large skillet with a bit of oil (veggie or olive oil will work)8) Place cabbage rolls in the skillet and cook until the cabbage is lightly browned. Flip and sear other side of the cabbage rolls. *This is the secret to really tasty Klumpke because the cabbage gains lots of flavor when browned!9) After browning all of the rolls, place the rolls, cooking liquid, and sauce ingredients into a slow cooker on low setting for 6-8 hours.

Avoid the Sneeze Pee

admin

18 January 2019

Adult Guide to Urine Incontinence

At my family medicine clinic, Beyond Primary Care, located in Ann Arbor Michigan, I see a fair number of individuals who experience urinary incontinence. Urinary incontinence is when urine leaks, from a number of causes, that becomes frequent or severe enough to be a problem. Incontinence happens in men and women. Unless I specifically ask some individuals, some may think that incontinence is an unavoidable part of getting older or a known consequence of child birth. I wanted to tell everyone that urinary incontinence can be addressed with both non-medication and medication intervention. In this guide, I talk about non-medication treatments.

Your Anatomy

The bladder is a hollow sac (like a balloon) with muscular walls. It sits behind the pelvic bone. The bladder is part of the urinary system, which includes two kidneys, two ureters, a bladder, and a urethra. The kidneys take waste and water out of your blood to make urine. The urine travels down your ureters to the bladder. When you’re ready to urinate, the urine empties through the urethra.

What is Average

It sounds like kind of a lot, but, depending on how much liquid you drink, peeing roughly 8 times during the day is average. Even though it’s annoying, getting up once to twice during the night is also considered normal. Most bladders hold about 2 cups of fluid (473 mL). A classic excuse among the frequent pee-ers: “I just have a small bladder!” Turns out, there’s some truth to that seemingly odd refrain. Anatomically, everybody can be different, just like some people are tall and some people are short.

Turn Perception into Measurements

If you’re irked by how much time you spend atop the throne, consider keeping a diary to chart your bathroom breaks. When you actually tally up your trips, what feels like a lot might be totally normal. Again, most bladders hold about 2 cups of fluid. If you’re going to the bathroom frequently and producing less than that, that may not be normal.And yes, you should actually measure. Grab a container and see if you’re hitting 1.5 to 2 cups.

Existing Medications &Other Causes

Take a look at your existing medications. Medications may lead to incontinence. As example, diuretics (water-pills) used to treat high blood pressure can cause the kidneys to make a lot of urine really quickly. Review your medications with your doctor.

Diabetes: If you’ve ruled out other causes, there’s a chance your constant peeing is due to diabetes. If your blood sugar’s high, the kidneys won’t be able to process all of it, and some can spill into the urine. That sugar will essentially pull more water out of you, so you’ll be generating more pee.

Urinary Tract Infection:Signs of an infection may include pelvic pain, increased frequency, increased urgency, and possible blood in the urine.

Pelvic Support and Urinary Tract Problems: The pelvic organs are held in place by supportive tissues and muscles. Problems occur when these tissues are stretched, weakened, or altered by stool impaction, pregnancy, childbirth, abnormal growths, fistulas, or aging.

Treatment to Avoid the Sneeze Pee

Keep Drinking Fluids. Understandably, if you spend a lot of time thinking you have to pee, you might be inclined to dehydrate yourself just a touch. If you don’t drink as much, you won’t have to go as often, right? Turns out this way of thinking is bladder sabotage. When you drink less, the urine becomes more concentrated, and the more concentrated it is the more irritating it can be to the bladder, which can trigger the sensation that you have to go more often.”

Timed voids. The good news for the small bladdered is that you can train your bladder to hold more fluid. If you give into the urges too often, you are training the bladder not to hold as much (Just don’t hold it so long that it starts to hurt). You could be inadvertently doing this if you’ve preemptively started emptying your bladder more frequently in just-in-case scenarios, like in hopes of warding off leakage, say, before a workout.To train your small bladder to bulk up, implement “timed voiding”:

Urinate every 30 minutes for two days, whether you have to go or not.

Add 15 minutes to the regimen: Urinate every 45 minutes for two days.

Keep adding 15 minutes to this regimen, until over time you have trained your bladder.

Hitting the (pelvic floor) gym. The stronger those down-there muscles, the easier it is to hold urine in. It’s better to learn how to use your muscles to tighten the pelvic-floor area. Yes, we’re talking about Kegel exercises. If you don’t already know, the exercises are performed by tightening and releasing the muscles you’d use to stop the flow of urine without moving anything else in your body. Find your pelvic muscles by tightening the rectum as if trying not to pass gas or pinching off a stool. Done best after emptying the bladder. Tighten and hold for up to 3-5 seconds, then release and relax 5 seconds. As muscles get stronger, progress to 10 seconds. Do these exercises 10-20 times a session, 3 times a day. Remember to breath normally. It may take 4-6 weeks to notice results.

Gabapentin as a Controlled Substance

This past Monday, 1/7/18, the state of Michigan classified Gabapentin (brand name Neurontin) as a controlled substance (C V) as it has been increasingly been reported abused by some patients.

Gabapentin is approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to treat epilepsy and neuropathic pain caused by shingles. That is it! However, as many people already recognize it is prescribed ‘off label’ by health care providers for various reasons including including depression, anxiety, migraine, fibromyalgia, muscle and joint pain, and bipolar disorder. According to some estimates, over 90% of Neurontin sales are for off-label uses. A report by IMS health found that 57 million prescriptions for Gabapentin were written in the U.S. in 2015, a 42% increase since 2011.

Many providers, including myself, have never screened for Gabapentin abuse in the past as this medication is not tracked by the state’s controlled substance tracking system nor is it typically detectable in most office-based urine drug screens. When Gabapentin is taken alone there is little potential for abuse. Yet, when taken with other drugs, such as opioids, muscle relaxants, and other anxiety medications, there are reports that Gabapentin can have a euphoric effect.

While I see the concern for making Gabapentin a controlled substance in Michigan, it is going to be a tremendous headache for everyone. The community, hospitals, treatment facilities, and doctor offices.

Isn’t it ironic that Michigan is locking up Gabapentin (which IS affordable and has good application when used appropriately) but legalizing marijuana?

It will eventually be easier for people to smoke a joint then get Gabapentin.

Currently, a month supply at Beyond Primary Care for 300 mg (90 pills) is $4.59. The street value for Gabapentin just went up because of this classification and that makes me concerned. Hell, the CDC lists Gabapentin as a non-opioid alternative treatment for pain control. This move by the State of Michigan makes my job as a physician, patient advocate, and provider certified in chronic pain management increasingly harder to deliver affordable and effective treatment to my patients.

BPC Good Eats: Meatloaf

admin

6 January 2019

Hello and thank you reading my blog at Beyond Primary Care and trying the BPC Good Eats recipes. This featured recipe is a Meatloaf. These recipes are my attempt, in a way, to bridge that Doctor’s adage of “Eat Better & Exercise More.” In this post, I will showcase a healthy meal made on a budget, my pictures are pretty decent, and that is how I got into this food endeavor.

Instructions:1) Preheat oven to 350.2) Mix together all of the ingredients for the loaf. Add additional bread crumbs if too wet, but mixture should be moist.3) Divide mixture into 4 separate loaves and place onto a foil-lined cookie sheet.4) Bake loaves for 30 minutes. Meanwhile, mix sauce ingredients together.5) After 30 minutes of baking, add sauce on top of the loaves. Bake for an additional 20 minutes.

Virtual Home Medicine in Direct Primary Care

admin

3 January 2019

Hi, thank you for reading! My name is Dr. Jeff O’Boyle. I am a board certified family medicine physician. My clinic, Beyond Primary Care is located in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In this post I am answering a common question that I receive, and that is how does Direct Primary Care (DPC) take care of it’s members with virtual home medicine? Virtual home medicine, also referred to as telemedicine, is a where you connect with your doctor via phone or computer’s webcam without physically being in the doctor’s office.

The Exception rather than the Rule

Why is it nearly impossible to get a doctor to talk with you over the phone in a timely fashion? Because because certain services like virtual home medicine are typically not be reimbursed by private insurance carriers and government payers. Nearly 40% of what we do in medical offices the patient doesn’t actually have to be there. But why are you there? That is the only way for doctors in a fee-for-service system to get reimbursed for your care, is to actually make the patient physically come in to the brick-and-mortar office to be seen- no matter how routine (eg- common cold, urinary tract infection) or obscure (filling-out paperwork for FMLA or work) the visit seems.

Standard of Care with DPC

Under the DPC model of care, we naturally provide such care – yet another freedom we enjoy together as a result of our independence from the restrictions of third-party payment. As noted by this Forbes article, telemedicine pairs well with DPC. Since DPC has opted out of insurance contracts altogether, and we contract directly with you, the patient. DPC offers our patients around-the-clock access to primary care medical needs in exchange for an average fee of $50-75 per month. Phone calls, emails, texts, FaceTime- are included in a patient’s membership. Patient are routinely connected with their doctors within minutes to hours when reaching out, versus days to weeks with fee-for-service doctors.

Benefits of Virtual Home Medicine

One of the defining characteristics of DPC is that we keep our practices small so we can spend more time with our patients. Because we have the increased time in our visits to know you well, we can streamline your care when you’re sick away from home or even at home. Many illnesses can be diagnosed and treated with a simple conversation by phone or computer webcam.

Say you are traveling out of state and feel sick. You have access to a conversation with your DPC doctor from your pocket. We will discuss your symptoms, discuss management, then we’ll locate the nearest pharmacy and order the medications most appropriate for your present circumstances.

As a doctor, there have been times where I have seen patients- with just the act of walking from the waiting room to the examination room- get winded or experience excruciating pain. Why would doctor offices allow this? Where is the concept ‘first, do no harm?’ If you are local, often times the DPC doctor may deliver the medications right to your address, saving you the hassle of a trip that may potentially worsen the condition.

Curbside Referral Consult

Adding more value the DPC membership at no additional cost to our patients is many DPC practices participate with electronic consults, or online consultations for speciality care. Primary care can handle nearly 80-90% of all medical conditions, but there are times when a condition may be past our scope of practice. Instead of rushing the patient to the nearest specialist, which will result in a bill likely through the patient’s insurance, many DPC practices seek medical advice on behalf of our patients through an online service call RubiconMD. Through this online service, many DPC practices pay a monthly fee where we can get medical advice on behalf of our patients from more than 100 medical specialities. The company guarantees a response time within twelve hours. The DPC physician fills out the necessary forms, get’s the response through the RubiconMD service, then will pass this medical information onto the patient- at no cost!

BPC Good Eats: Creamy Portobello and Wild Rice Soup

admin

27 December 2018

Hello and thank you reading my blog at Beyond Primary Care and trying the BPC Good Eats recipes. This featured recipe is a Creamy Portobello and Wild Rice Soup. These recipes are my attempt, in a way, to bridge that Doctor’s adage of “Eat Better & Exercise More.” In this post, I will showcase a healthy meal made on a budget, my pictures are pretty decent, and that is how I got into this food endeavor.

Instructions1) In a stock pot over medium heat, follow-package directions to cook the wild rice.2) Heat a large pot over medium-low heat. Add the mushrooms, celery, carrots, and onions. Cook, stirring often, until softened, about 6-8 minutes.3) Stir in the flour, salt, and pepper. Cook for additional 2 minutes stirring constantly.4) Add the white wine and thyme, increase the heat to medium-high and cook for additional 2 minutes, until liquid has cooked off.5) Pour in the vegetable broth and bring to a boil. Cover the pot, reduce heat, and simmer for 10 minutes until vegetables are tender.6) Stir in the wild rice, greek yogurt, and parsley to serve.